In part one of our Ultimate Guide to Seasonal Email Marketing we will be covering why email makes for the best holiday marketing tool. Additionally, we will also look at how to write the best seasonal subject lines.
In part 2 of our Ultimate guide to Seasonal Email Marketing we will be looking at different holiday email examples. Furthermore, we will also be taking a look into the best types of call to actions.
Without a doubt the holiday seasons are the busiest and lucrative times of the year. It’s important to note that this statement is relevant for most businesses and not all. This year is even more important to get those email marketing strategies perfected and push for the final quarter revenue. In Fact this year has seen 10 years worth of e-commerce penetration growth in exactly 3 months. This opens up a major opportunity for those brands to make up for underperforming at the start of the year due to situational setbacks.
After the year we’ve had you deserve your Christmas sales season to be merry and bright, but to do this you’re going to have to nail your email marketing plan. Emails provide endless opportunities to attract new buyers, connect with your fans, offer reward programmes and exclusive promotions.
As you make your way through our guide you will start to feel more and more confident and hopefully start to adapt your current strategy. Read on to see how you can make this your most successful and rewarding season.
Why is Email the Best Seasonal Marketing Tool?
Regardless of the time of year, holidays will always provide a range of great opportunities for marketing. Not only do they allow you to reach out to current subscribers, but also friends and family of those. You can therefore generate more leads by pushing your subscribers to share the value you offer with others.
Emails are perfect for the Mobile Orientated World
The use of mobile phones is an upward trend so it’s no surprise that the number of consumers using mobiles to Christmas shop is ever growing. To further back this up a report by Castor showed purchases on mobile phones increased from 3.4% to 36.7% in 4 years. Research also shows that 63% of Cyber Monday and 76% of Black Friday emails were opened on a mobile device.
Emails Provide Easy & Quick Purchase Options
It’s important to remember that your customers are equally as busy as you during the seasonal period. Therefore finding ways to speed up their buying process is mutually beneficial for both the customer and your business. “Buy Now” buttons are a simple and effective way to reduce the purchase time, 41% of retailers are already using these in their campaigns. Not only is it speeding up the journey but also highlighting gifts, special offers and events.
Emails Support Campaigns
Already emails are being used to showcase gift ideas, promote sales, highlight holiday events and so on. Emails are also a great way to support other campaigns within your seasonal marketing strategy, from social media sales, reward programs and competitions.
Seasonal Subject Lines
Questions
Why are questions great ideas? Because they’re instantly engaging, making them the perfect subject line trick. Turn your content into a question, for example:
“Need some gift ideas?”
“What would make your Christmas perfect?”
Personalisation
Customer experience is key, so why not make that extra effort to personalise each email? Research shows emails with personalised subject lines are 26% more likely to be opened.
Attention
Grab your subscribers attention by using power words in your subject line. For sales driven objectives you should use power words such as, promotion, discount, free shipping, savings and hot deal. Another example is for timeliness objectives, to which you’d use power words such as, order now, last minute, exclusive, limited-time, open now and today only.
Clear
During the seasonal period your subscribers will be receiving a huge range of other emails, so it’s important your offer is obvious. Don’t make the user have to hut for your offer but instead feature it clearly in your subject line.
Emoji’s
Not only do emojis in the subject line draw attention but they have also increased unique opening rates by 45%. So don’t hold back on your trees, santas, stars and especially snowmen which is the emoji to drive the highest open rate.
It’s Time for Part 2…
At this point you should feel pretty confident in understanding why it’s even more important to put attention towards email marketing campaigns during seasonal holiday. Don’t miss out on our Part 2 of The Ultimate Guide to Seasonal Email Mark